


Tal-Vashoth

by summerrain24601



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-23
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2019-04-07 02:45:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14071206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerrain24601/pseuds/summerrain24601
Summary: After the first night together, he holds her in his arms, and he wonders.





	Tal-Vashoth

She slept curled up against his chest, his arms around her. For once, he noticed, she looked relaxed. He hadn't seen her truly relaxed since the attack on Haven. And now, here she was, in his arms, dozing away. He looked down at her, not for the first time running a hand lightly over her corkscrew horns. 

She had corrected him, the first time they spoke in Haven, that she was not Tal-Vashoth. The Tal-Vashoth, she had said, were born under the Qun and chose to leave it. She called herself Vashoth, one of the qunari people born outside the Qun. He wondered, now, if she was right. He hadn't met many of their people born outside the Qun, though he supposed they must have kept to themselves. The guarded, distrustful look on her face that day had changed since then. She no longer looked at him like that. 

Now, he had earned her respect for his ability in battle, and she had earned his for her own. He was beginning to see the truth, that she wasn't like the Tal-Vashoth he'd had to fight in Seheron and Par Vollen. She wasn't like the ones who had left the Qun during that mess in Kirkwall. He knew of the Valo-Kas company, and he'd heard good things about them, though their two groups had never met. His company worked mainly in Orlais, while the one she'd been part of had maintained more of a presence up in the Free Marches. But he'd heard Shokrakar was good at what she did, and he respected her for it. But if she wasn't like the Tal-Vashoth he'd been ordered to kill, did that mean those Tal-Vashoth might have been different too?

Her face scrunched up as the mark on her hand flared that eerie green color, the same color as the rifts and the Breach before them. It was the same look she wore when she was using the mark to close said rifts, and he found himself taking her marked left hand in his. After a moment, the glow faded and she relaxed once more.

He recalled their first meeting, out on the Storm Coast. He'd gotten word of Venatori activity, and sent his Lieutenant, Krem, to Haven to reach out. She'd taken the invitation, and rushed into the battle with flames licking her staff, casting spells left and right to eliminate or incapacitate, or throwing barriers up around her own allies. Her skin was the color of raw iron, and her eyes a bright, vibrant purple that he hadn't seen since leaving Par Vollen, a rare color even there. She was a force of nature all on her own. Add in Sera or Varric, and Cassandra or Blackwall, and they were a damn near unstoppable team. It was no wonder to him that she'd been asked to lead the Inquisition. 

His fingers on her back brushed against a scar that ran across her shoulder. A wound from a Red Templar during the attack on Haven, one that she'd tried to heal herself only to have it reopen again and get even worse during the snowstorm that had followed. That, he remembered, had been when he first was afraid for her. No, not quite. The first time he was afraid for her was when he saw the scorch marks on the floor in the throne room of Redcliffe Castle. But after Haven, he'd felt different about it. A difference he hadn't been able to figure out at the time. A difference he still didn't quite understand. 

Her attempts at flirting had been pretty obvious to him, and this was the result of him casually confronting her about it. He didn't want to think that it meant more than just having fun. He wouldn't allow himself to think that way, it was too soon. But someone else's words, words from long, long ago, came back to him now. He'd almost forgotten them. He barely remembered the Tamassran who'd said it, when he'd casually mentioned the dragon's tooth necklace he saw her wearing. 

Love isn't something you choose, she'd told him. It's something you fall into. 

Physical relations were normal. Expected, even. Sex was about passion, about the continuation of the qunari people. As he'd told her once, it was like someone in the south going to see a healer. Readily available whenever someone wanted it. It didn't mean anything on an emotional level. It never had.

So why was it that having this woman, this feisty little Vashoth mage, asleep in his arms made him feel so… at peace?


End file.
